After an encouraging 4-0 start, Notre Dame men’s basketball let the air out of the balloon. For now.

The Irish lost 84-77 to Elon on Friday, falling to a team that finished 12th in the Coastal Athletic Association.

“Our defense let us down today,” the Notre Dame head coach said Micah Shrewsberry said after the game.

However, the Irish have a chance to put the air back in the balloon this week as they enter the middle of their non-conference schedule. They flew to Las Vegas on Sunday for the Players Era Festival, a unique “NIL-driven” multi-team event (MTE) in which they will compete against three quality opponents.

Here’s everything you need to know about the Players Era Festival.

Notre Dame in Players Era Festival game information

• Teams: Notre Dame (4-1, 0-0 ACC) vs. Rutgers (4-1, 0-0 Big Ten), No. 6 Houston (3-1, 0-0 Big 12) and TBA
• Possible third opponents: San Diego State, No. 21 Creighton, RV Oregon and No. 20 Texas A&M
• Dates: Tuesday, November 26 (Rutgers); Thursday, November 28 (Houston); Saturday November 30 (to be determined)
• Times: 10:30 PM ET (Rutgers); 12:30 PM ET (Houston); to be determined (to be determined)
• Location: MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada
• Television: TBS
• Radio: 960 WSBT-AM in South Bend

How the ‘NIL-driven’ Players Era Festival works

Tournament format

Eight teams are heading to Las Vegas for the MTE and are split into two groups of four. Notre Dame’s group, the ‘Impact Group’, also includes Rutgers, Houston and Alabama. The other group, the “Power Group,” includes Oregon, San Diego State, Texas A&M and Creighton.

Each team will play two of the three other teams in their group, with Game 1 on Tuesday and Game 2 on Wednesday. After Game 2, each group is seeded 1-4 based on record, with the tiebreaks being 1) Head-to-head, 2) Points difference, with a limit of plus or minus 20 points per game, 3) Total points scored points and 4 ) Total points allowed.

On Saturday, No. 1 of the Impact Group will face No. 1 of the Power Group in the first-place match. The No. 2 seeds and each group will face off in the third-place game, and so on and so forth.

NIL aspect

This is why Notre Dame withdrew from the original MTE, the Rady Children’s Invitational in San Diego.

Each team will receive $1 million in name, image and likeness fees for participating in the Players Era Festival, with an additional $500k for the champion.

If that sounds like pay-for-play, it is, and yes, pay-for-play is still technically against NCAA rules. But the Players Era Festival gets around that and adheres to NCAA standards. According to The Associated Press, “players must appear at support events (during the week in Las Vegas) to receive NIL money.”

Match-up notables

Rutgers

• The Scarlett Knights suffered a shocking loss of their own. Rutgers traveled to Kennesaw State as 12.5 points (a 12.5 point favorite) and lost 79-77 on a last-second turnover by freshman forward Ace Bailey.

Despite the blunder – which ended in a game where the Scarlett Knights trailed by as many as 21 early in the second half – Bailey has been everything Rutgers thought he would be when it made him the unanimous No. 2 player in the country. . The 6-foot-1 forward has averaged 19.0 points and 5.7 rebounds per game so far.

• Bailey joined the combo guard Dylan Harper – the near-unanimous No. 3 player in the class of 2024 (ESPN has him at No. 4) – in an all-time great recruiting class for the Scarlett Knights. Harper is the son of Ron Harperwho won three NBA championships with the Chicago Bulls, and the brother of ex-Rutgers star Ron Harper Jr. He is averaging 19.5 points, 5.0 rebounds and 5.2 assists per game this season.

• Notre Dame and Rutgers share a problem going forward: rebounding. The Scarlett Knights rebounded 54-33, allowing 20 Kennesaw State offensive boards.

Houston

• As always, Houston’s defense is phenomenal. The Cougars allow fewer points per game (50.8) than anyone in the country, nearly three full points ahead of No. 2 (Providence at 53.6).

• The Cougars also have an extremely balanced offensive attack, with eight players averaging between 7.5 and 11.8 points per game. They are also an experienced team, led by a senior forward J’Wan Robertsjunior guard Emanuel Sharp and graduate student guard L.J. Cryer.

• Cryer is an elite three-point shooter who has never shot below 38 percent from beyond the arc since his freshman year. However, Sharp makes threes at a truly unheard of pace. He is on 11 of 15 so far this season, good for 73.3 percent.